Sundial

Artist:

Location:

Location

Neighborhood:

Charlestown

Type:

Sculpture

Year:

1991

Medium:

Bronze and Granite

Collection:

City of Boston

Funders:

Browne Fund

Description:

In the mid-1980s, Charlestown residents and business-owners teamed up to revitalize their neighborhood’s public spaces. The renovation of Hayes Square was completed in 1991 with the installation of this sundial sculpture. Lu Stubbs, a long-time resident of the Boston suburb Sharon and a graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, designed the piece specifically for this site, drawing inspiration from discussions with an archeologist involved in excavations in colonial Charlestown. Stubbs chose to include images depicting the daily lives of early Charlestown homemakers and craftspeople. Look closely at the sundial’s bronze relief numbers to find images of a blacksmith, a shipbuilder, a spinner, a baker, and a cabinetmaker, among others. Through these figures, Stubbs links Charlestown’s past to this contemporary space.